


it only hurts when it burns

by alittleduck



Category: American Vandal (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Enemies to Lovers, M/M, Secret Identity, Supernatural Elements
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-12-13
Updated: 2018-12-13
Packaged: 2019-09-17 10:41:31
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,599
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16973073
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alittleduck/pseuds/alittleduck
Summary: Ever since Sam was hit by magic, multicolored lightening and woke up in the hospital, he's been able to -- do things. Move faster. And he isn't the only one -- Hanover is filled with the rejects of a would-be superhero blockbuster film, right down to the costumes.And it would be fine. It would be great. If Sam didn't have a giant crush on the number one super-villain in town, or if a strangely organized crew would stop breaking into labs on the outskirts of towns and burning down houses.aka, the one where they have superpowers and everyone gets to call Sam a little bitch.





	it only hurts when it burns

**Author's Note:**

> sorry everyone!! this was up before, but I rewrote the entire thing and -- well -- here u go!!

Sam was late. In and of itself, not an unusual phenomenon. But right now, it’s downright dangerous. He tried to force himself to run faster, which was almost an oxymoron. He was pretty sure he was fast enough to break the sound barrier at this point, but if he didn’t get there soon, people might die --

“Sam, he’s leaving. Sam!”

“There!” He yelled. “I’m here.” He looked around. “The gold bank?”

“Where else?” Gabi asked. “Run, bitch.”

Sam ran inside. There was a blond kid in oversized goggles pointing his finger at a huddled crowd. 

“Stop!” Sam called out. 

“Slipstream?” the kid asked. “They said -- they said you wouldn’t be here.”

What? Sam thought, but didn’t have time to dwell on it. “Leave these people alone. Stop hurting them.”

“I’m not hurting them,” the kid protested. “I -- fuck it,” he said and shot an ice dagger out of his fist at Sam. 

Woah, Sam thought as he dodged out of the way. That’s new. 

“Ice powers?” Sam asked. “You have ice powers?”

The kid scoffed. “The best kind,” he said. “Ice is actually a fascinating substance that can be subli -- sublimatationed, at a rate that -- that far exceeds anything your speed could ever hope to approach.”

Sam tried to run at the kid, only to have a block of ice thrown in his way that he had to move around. Before he could do anything else, the kid was walling himself up in ice which -- well, it told Sam everything he needed to know about this heist. 

Sam’s hands vibrated against the ice walls, shattering them and then he swiftly ducked around and through the kid’s outstretched arms to grab him behind the back. Like most super-villains, he seemed to have no idea what he was actually doing. There had been a lot of them lately, which was really strange. Especially after Radiowave’s disappearance last year. Sam could’ve sworn that super-villains were coming to an end -- I mean, only so many people were hit during the blackout of Sam’s freshman year. 

“Face it, Cold Freeze --” Sam began, reaching around for his rope. 

Cold Freeze grinned. “I get a nickname?” he asked. 

“I know right?” Sam replied. “Aren’t they so fucking dope?”

“Yeah, hella ‘dope’,” Cold Freeze awkwardly quoted back at him.  

Then Sam remembered why he was here. “Face it, Cold Freeze,” he resumed. “I’ve caught you red-handed.”

“Is that a joke about my superpowers?”

“It’s what I was going for,” Sam admitted. “Did it work?”

“Kind of,” Cold Freeze replied. “I liked it but I felt could’ve been a bit stronger, especially in elongating the metaphorical impacts of the, you know, superpower.”

This guy was kind of weird, Sam thought. 

“Why are you doing this?” he asked, curiously and watched as Cold Freeze’s face just shut down. 

“Maybe it’s something I have always wanted to do and now, I finally can. I just -- can you just -- there’s some valuable stuff here that I need to --”

“You can’t,” Sam replied. 

“Slipstream,” Cold Freeze pleaded. “You don’t understand.”

“Make me,” Sam said. 

“I -- “ But he didn’t add anything else to that, just continued to look tortured and miserable under his mask. 

“Look,” Sam said. “I like you. You appreciate my humor. You’ve got the proper respect for the fun of superhero-ing. So I’ll make you a deal. I’ll let you go now -- after you give everyone back their money -- if you answer my questions.”

Cold Freeze looked desperately around.  _ Wow _ , Sam thought.  _ This was actually working _ ? 

“You have thirty seconds,” Sam said, and waited. “Ten,” he warned. “Nine. Eight. Seven --”

“No,” Cold Freeze said, and squeezed his eyes shut. “I can’t. I --” he gestured toward the camera. “I’m as good as caught anyway,” he said. He dropped all the bags. “Just, take me to the police.”

_ I am amazing _ , Sam thought.  _ I’m literally just an icon _ . He ignored the voice in his head that was saying that he wasn’t an icon because, actually, he still didn’t have all the information he needed, that this was actually a net loss and that Cold Freeze was the third or fourth supervillain who refused to talk or take any sort of plea deal. 

Sam walked him outside, to where the police cars were just starting to gather, sirens wailing, holding Cold Freeze out in front of him. 

The police chief did not look happy when Sam walked up to him but Wilkins had learned that it was better to work with Slipstream than against him. 

After that, Sam turned to walk away. He hadn’t gone more than half a foot before there was a massive explosion behind him. One of the police cars had imploded, setting fire to the car in front of and behind it. In the confusion, Cold Freeze had started to slip away. Sam turned to race after him when -- he disappeared? 

“Fuck,” Sam pushed a button on his headset. “Gabi, Cold Freeze got away.”

“What?” Gabi asked. 

“Yeah,” Sam explain. “It was just after I passed him over to the police. I think he had someone working with him, who has some sort of invisibility and/or fire power.”

“Shit,” Gabi said. “Is this the same guy --”

“Who's been behind the twelve lab break ins over the last six months? I think so. I tried giving Cold Freeze a deal, but.”

“He wouldn’t take it?” Gabi asked. 

“Yeah,” Sam said. “And he seemed scared. I don’t like what’s happening, Gabi. I think it’s something bad. Last year, when it was mostly just me and Radiowave --”

“Radiowave is a bad guy, Sam.”

“No,” Sam insisted. “He was a supervillain or whatever, but he wasn’t a bad guy.”

“I mean, Radiowave doesn’t usually have a death toll,” Sam pointed out, because apparently _Sam_  was the one with a death wish. 

“I don’t know why you keep defending him,” Gabi replied. 

Sam didn’t really know either but -- “he just seems human, Gabi. I think he’s trying to do the right thing. I don’t know. What do you do if, one morning after the world has just ripped you the fuck off, you wake up and discover you have powers? You make the world pay.”

“But he’s hurting people.”

“Not -- usually,” Sam protests. “And --”

“He got Krantz fired,” Gabi countered. 

“Yeah,” Sam said, “but is that really any great loss to Hanover High’s curriculum?”

Gabi snorted at that. It really wasn’t. 

“And anyway,” Sam pointed out, “he hasn’t even been active in months.”

Gabi conceded his point. They’d had this conversation before. A lot. They’d had this conversation a lot. It was something of a joke between them at this point -- or, not so much a joke so much as something Gabi teased him about. His crush on Radiowave. 

She usually didn’t mention his crush on Radiowave when he wasn’t in costume, but she’d slipped up once in English class and made some sort of joke about Sam and Radiowave pounding it out in front of Peter who had turned bright red and hadn’t been able to make eye contact with Sam for the rest of the day. 

“Just, come over to the Treehouse for a debrief, okay?” Gabi said. “I’m there now and I think I’m looking at something I want to show you.”

The Treehouse was an old treehouse of Sam’s neighbors who was arrested for running a meth lab when Sam was in seventh grade and never seen again. It had started as just a house in a tree, but Gabi had brought half a pound of electronics and wiring into that bitch and had been running complex algorithms ever since. 

Sam was there in less than a minute. “Hey, Gabs,” he said, and took a seat. 

Gabi pointed at the computer. “I was running an analysis on all the recent thefts in the area and -- this pattern jumped out at me, so I ran a regression on it and --”

“No way,” Sam breathed. 

“Yeah,” Gabi said. “Exactly what I thought. There’s a strong correlation between thefts with ice residue -- or unusually cold temperatures -- and this really weird type of metal. I was looking it up, but all I could find were like these three publications on it. I have no idea what it does.”

“But the thefts you’re attributing to Cold Freeze --”

“Is that really what we’re calling him?”

“Yes,” Sam said firmly. “I thought of it and so therefore it’s perfect and hilarious.”

“Sure,” Gabi said. “If that’s what you need to tell yourself.”

Sam redirected her back to the case, mostly because he couldn’t think of anything witty to say in response. “These thefts -- the ones done by Cold Freeze -- they only account for about a third of the lab thefts for this metal xsofyproxine -- how the hell do you say that?”

“Let’s call it Xine,” Gabi suggested, which Sam immediately agreed to do. 

“Okay, so there have been about twelve Xine thefts, right?” 

“Yes,” Gabi agreed. 

“And about four of them are most likely done by Cold Freeze, right?”

“Yes.” 

“Okay, so who's responsible for the other eight?”

“That’s the question,” Gabi told him. 

 

* * *

 

The next day, Gabi left around lunchtime to interview one of the scientists at Axiome lab, responsible for working on Xine. They shared a visual media class in the afternoon that didn’t take attendance. 

“I would go,” Sam said, “but --”

“You’d miss a prime opportunity to stare longingly at the back of Peter Maldonado’s head?” Gabi asked. 

“See, you get it,” Sam replied. “I’m so glad you understand.”

“You’re such a ho,” Gabi responded, laughing. “You’re lucky I love you.”

So Gabi left to do actual, important work towards solving the case and saving the world and Sam? Sam sat in a pointless art class and stared longingly at the back of Peter Maldonado’s head. 

Or, at least, he was planning on doing that, but Peter wasn’t there today which, honestly, was so rude. Sam personally felt like class attendance and participation were two of the most important and unvalued -- okay, so maybe he just wanted to stare longingly at the back of his head. 

It felt like being ripped off. Maybe this was God’s way of telling him that he should’ve joined Gabi. He could probably still sneak off to the bathroom. 

The door snapped open and Sam jumped almost a full foot in the air. Hey, that was Peter. And he was … drenched?

“Sorry,” he stammered, making his way towards the back. 

Oh no, Sam thought, as Peter got closer and closer. He looked desperately around the room, but the only seat left was -- next to him. Peter sat down next to him, water pouring off his body. 

“What the hell happened to you?” Sam asked, because his mouth rarely stopped to check in with his brain before spouting off just the most inane garbage. 

“It’s raining,” Peter replied. 

“Yeah, but you look like you got drowned.”

“It’s raining,” Peter repeated, stubbornly. “Really hard.”

“No kidding,” Sam snorted, and then wanted to kick himself. How was he this bad at flirting? How? 

“Sam!” the teacher barked and Peter flinched away from the noise. 

“Sorry!” Sam called out. “We’ll be quiet.”

“No,” the teacher said, “not that. You and Peter are first up to come get your equipment.”

“What?” Sam asked, but the teacher didn’t answer. She only shook a pan of cameras and chords at them aggressively. 

“We’re partners,” Peter whispered to him. “She just assigned us to be partners, for the midterm film project.”

“The what?” Sam whispered back. 

“Go get the cameras,” Peter said. “I’ll explain when you’re back.”

Sam went and got the cameras. Apparently they were supposed to be making a fake documentary, exploring one issue they had talked about in class. 

“Oh,” Sam said to Peter. “What?”

“I was thinking we could do street art, or digital art,” Peter said, kind of giving Sam a bit of a look. Which was -- okay, it was very well deserved but. Sam was out there being a superhero, alright, he didn’t have time to pay attention to every bonkers lecture Ms Atwood hit them with. 

“Sounds good,” Sam agreed, quickly. He ignored the Gabi sounding voice in his head that said he’d agree with anything Peter said, as long as it was  _ Peter  _ saying it. It was really unfair how Gabi wasn’t even here and she was still managing to mock him. 

“Great,” Peter said. “It’s just that, I was thinking that how social media and how our modern world has impact art would just -- I mean, it would be a really interesting and, um, relevant way to --”

“It’s a great idea,” Sam told him. “Sorry, if I’m -- if I know nothing about art.”

“Me neither,” Peter admitted, “but I like filming things and, um, editing film.”

“Oh shit!” Sam said. “That’s fucking dope. Do you want to be, like, a film maker or something?”

“That’d be,” Peter adjusted his glasses, “nice. But, probably not. You know. Possible.”

“Dude, pursue your dreams. I know you’d be a fantastic film maker and all you’ve done is come up with one half baked project idea.” Okay, maybe Sam was laying it on a little thick. So what? So what if Sam was basically wearing a blinking neon sign screaming crush? 

It’s not like he could do anything about it. 

“I can’t,” Peter told him. “My family -- I just don’t think it would work out. It’s not -- I’ll find other things to do. And, um. Other ways to -- not illegal ways or anything, but just other ways -- of expressing that creativity. Or whatever.”

“How would you even express film making in an illegal way? Really, really intense streaming?”

“Um, I don’t know.” Peter shrugged. “But just in case.”

“Yeah, dude, I feel you.”

They made plans to meet later after school to work on their project, but, as Sam explained to Peter, first he had to go meet Gabi. Gabi was at a UTI appointment and needed morally support, Sam had further explained, even though Peter hadn’t really asked. He grinned evilly internally when picturing Gabi’s face when she heard about this. It was going to be great. 

 

* * *

 

“Sam, this is terrible.”

“I know.” 

“I mean, really terrible.”

“I know.”

“No, Sam, I mean --”

“Gabi, I know,” Sam said, exasperated. “I know, I know I know. I’m looking at the same manilla file you are.”

“Like, I know, but this is just -- this is just extraordinary.”

“Gabi,” Sam said. “If you don’t snap out of it, I will slap you.”

“Sorry,” Gabi said, “it’s just that. This is bad.”

“No fucking shit,” Sam replied. “Whoever is breaking into these labs is doing it on purpose. And they’re doing it well.”

“And --”

“And they’re maybe going to try to take over the actual world?” Sam interrupted. 

“I was going to say they’re a major creep, but yours works too,” Gabi said. “I mean, if you think about it, this Xine that this guy -- girl -- person -- is trying to get has a horrifying implications in regards to rape and sexual abuse.”

Sam blinked at her. “I hadn’t even thought of that, but you’re right. With the coercive effects on the mind it’s -- it’d be kind of like a date rape drug on steroids. But -- what do they want?”

“I don’t know,” Gabi admitted. “But look, we know that he’s -- she’s -- they’re working through other people. We just -- need to get one of those people to talk.”

Just then, Sam’s cell interrupted their conversation. He glanced down. Peter. “Shit,” Sam said. “I’m late to meet up with Peter. We’re supposed to work on this project, but I don’t know if we’re going to get around to that.”

“Sam,” Gabi said. “We have to do something about this. Really do something. Not just, you know, mess around like we usually do.”

“You’re right,” Sam agreed. “And we will. But it can wait until tomorrow, can’t it? How often does Peter Maldonado call me?”

“Never?” Gabi asked. 

“That’s right,” Sam said proudly. “Never.”

“You do know that’s not really a brag, right?” Gabi asked. 

Sam frowned at her. “You do know that you’re a little bitch, don’t you?”

Gabi laughed. “Bye, Sam. You don’t want to be even more late.”

Five seconds later, Sam was rounding the corner by the school. He forced himself to slow down, which was an agonizing process. Peter was sitting off to the side, on a bench, doing homework in a grid lined notebook that said ‘calc’ on the top, in big blocky capitals. 

“Dude,” Sam created him. “How’s calc going?”

“It’s not calc,” Peter said. 

“Then why do you have the words ‘CALC’ written in big blocky capitals on the top?” Sam wasn’t trying to call Peter out. He genuinely needed an explanation. 

Peter blushed. “I was pretending I was in a calc class,” he replied. 

“Why?” Sam asked. “Are you, like, a math dude?”

Peter gave him an incredulous snort. “Me? Do a math problem? Dude, no. I just want to be fucking done with math. And after calc, I’ll never have to take another math class again.”

“I kind of like math,” Sam said. 

“That’s because you’re a little bitch,” Peter replied. 

“Better that than a pretentious film dork,” Sam shot back, smiling. "Also, that's like the second time in the last day -- no, thirty seconds -- that someone has called me a little bitch. What the fuck?" 

“Pretentious actually refers to people who have no idea what they’re talking about. I might be a, a dork or a nerd, but I do know what I’m talking about,” Peter said. "And people are calling you a little bitch because you are one."

“I said what I said,” Sam replied. 

“Okay, whatever, Ecklund.”

“What -- did you just call me Ecklund? What are we, jocks at an all boys private high school with homoerotic subtext?”

“Obviously not,” Peter replied. "I -- what?"

“Then why the fuck are you calling me by my last name?” Sam asked. 

“Look I --” Peter said, and then stopped. “Shut up, I just did it, okay.”

Sam actually laughed out loud. “Whatever you say, Maldonado.”

“Oh my God,” Peter said. “You’re never going to let me live this down, are you?”

“Never,” Sam said proudly, grinning at him. 

Peter groaned and dropped his head onto the table in front of him. 

“You’re going to be like, eighty or something and I’m going to come over to your house where you live where your seventeen grandkids and --”

“Can I ask a question?” Peter interrupted. 

“No,” Sam said, and barreled forward. “And I’m going to come over and --”

“Why do I have seventeen grandkids?” Peter asked anway. “It doesn’t make sense, at a rate of 2.5 kids to my children that would mean I’d have to have six point eight kids myself --”

“And I’ll tell you and  _ all seventeen of your grandkids _ about the time you called me --”

“Why are my seventeen grandkids living with me in the first place? Have my other children died? All six point eight of them?” 

Sam valiantly struggled forward, raising his voice over Peter’s and trying not to laugh. “And I’ll tell them about the time you called me Ecklund --”

“Will they even care, at that point? I mean, realistically, they’re orphans living with their sixty year old grandfather and all their cousins and you’re this random old white dude whose busting in to --”

“Peter, you’re so morbid,” Sam said in response.

Peter shrugged. “I mean, yeah.” 

“You’re children aren’t dead, they’re just -- on vacation, or something.”

“Together?” Peter asked. “No offense, but I think that if I have six point eight kids, they probably wouldn’t all get along. And if they did get a along, they wouldn’t all decide to take a vacation at the same time and leave their poor father responsible for seventeen kids by himself. That just seems rude. I’ve raised them better than that!” 

“No, no, they aren’t on vacation together. It’s just, like, a freak coincidence, okay, where they all just happened to take a vacation at the exact same time.”

“That’s ludicrous,” Peter said. “That’s just absurd.”

“Yeah, but it happened.”

“It wouldn’t happen,” Peter insisted. 

“But it did,” Sam replied. “It’s done, it’s the situation you’re in. You have these seventeen kids and you realize that you have nothing to do with them so you call me, your best buddie.”

“My best buddie?” Peter teased. “Bold claim for two people who don’t refer to each other by their first names, Ecklund.”

“You know what,” Sam said, “Just for that, all your children  _ are _ dead.”

“What?” Peter objected. “No, you can’t do that! You can’t go back on your premise like that!” 

“I can and I did.”

“No, no, you said they were on vacation --”

“Oh no!” Sam said, holding his fingers up to his, pretending to take a call. He put his hand over the imaginary speaker. “Peter, I’m terribly sorry to inform you but I’ve just gotten word that all your children passed away while on a suspicious timed six point eight way vacation.”

“This is bullying,” Peter told the table in front of him, because no one else was around to validate him. 

“Shut up,” Sam said. “What do you do next?”

“What do you mean, ‘what do I do next?”” Peter asked. 

“I mean, I’ve just come into to your secluded little cottage and insulted your name and honor and exposed you to all seventeen of your grandchildren who’ve just lost their parents -- but they don’t know it yet, so they’re not like sad and shit. What do you do?”

“What do I do in this ridiculously --”

“Realistic --”

“Scenario, that’ll never --”

“That’ll definitely --”

“Happen?” Peter finished. “I don’t know, probably shut the door in your face.”

“That’s it?” Sam demanded, and they were off. It was amazing, how easy it was to talk to Peter -- like they’d known each other for years, or like they already knew each other. Sam wondered what Peter thought about superheros -- what Peter would think about Supersonic, or about Sam’s not-crush, Radiowave. 

They didn’t do any work at all at the park, which meant that Sam invited Peter over to his house for dinner around seven and Peter texted his mom before saying yes immediately. That was kind of flattering. And Peter looked so cute, standing in front of him and blushing and -- no. 

Sam was not having these thoughts. He was very, very, very determined not to have these thoughts, even though Peter was the art student guy he had been quietly lusting after every day this semester. He was not going to have these thoughts because holy shit Peter was actually an amazing person, too, and Sam wasn’t fucking ruining that. Gabi always had the bravery for the both of them, not Sam. 

Peter had to go check it with his mom before coming over to Sam’s, which meant that Sam had an hour by himself. 

He spent fifty-nine minutes of that hour nervously pacing and speeding around his room. He was pretty sure he wore a permanent hole into the carpeting by his bed. 

Peter arrived a minute early, which meant that Sam still wasn’t dressed and his room wasn’t clean when Peter rang the doorbell. 

If Sam didn’t have superspeed, he honestly didn’t know what he’d do. How had he survived without it, literally how? 

Still, he sprinted down to the door the second he was dressed, terrified he had taken longer than the typical three and a half milliseconds and was so late that Peter had turned around and left, never to speak to him again. 

When he opened the door, Peter just said, “Wow, that was fast.”

“Sorry,” Sam said. “I had to get dressed.”

“Oh, no, I wasn’t actually -- I didn’t really -- I meant it. You were fast.”

Shit. Sam was so bad at this secret identity business. “You thought that was fast?” Sam said instead, quickly discovering another thing he wasn’t very good at. “You should see me in the bedroom.” Wow. He really was _terrible_ at this. Oh, God, what was he even saying? Why did he think that would be funny? 

“Is that, like, a brag?” Peter asked. 

“Please forget I said that,” Sam replied. “Like, shoot me in the face or something. Help me help us forget that I said.”

Peter laughed. “Never, dude. Now, are you going to let me in or what?”

Sam opened the door wide. “Whenever you’re ready,” he said and Peter walked inside. 

They went to Sam’s room, which was upstairs. Right across from his room where his twin sister’s bedrooms. “That’s where my twin sisters lived,” he explained, palms kind of sweaty for some reason. “Mom used to make them share a bed, but now they have bunk beds. They’re identical, which makes them the worst. They’re always running around, getting into hijinks. Do you have any siblings?”

“I’m an only child,” Peter said. 

Sam smirked at that. 

“Shut up,” Peter said. “I’m not -- ugh. There’s too much only child hate in the world. It’s discrimination.”

“It’s what?” Sam asked. 

“You heard me,” Peter replied. 

Sam laughed and shook his head. “Whatever you say, dude.”

“In an ideal world,” Peter agreed. “Everyone would just shut up and do exactly what I said.”

“In an ideal world, you would be a dictator?” Sam asked. 

“A benevolent one,” Peter corrected. 

“You’re unbelievable, Peter Maldonado,” Sam pronounced. “Oh, hey. In this benevolent dictatorship of yours, would everyone have to call each other by their last name only?”

“Of course,” Peter said. “On the pain of death.”

“Right, right. And this is what kind of dictatorship again?” Sam asked. 

“A benevolent one,” Peter replied. 

“A benevolent dictatorship where you kill people?” 

“Only when they don’t follow my rules.”

“Oh, okay,” Sam said. “Glad you cleared that one up.”

Peter laughed. “So, what do you say? You ready to be my second in command?”

“Oh, God,” Sam said. “Do I have to kill anybody?”

“For the greater good? Of course. You’re second in command of a brutal dictatorship,” Peter replied. 

“I thought you said it was a benevolent dictatorship.”

“All dictators say that. I just thought for my second in command I’d be able to tell the reality and not just what I want the truth to be.”

“Damn, Peter,” Sam said. “That’s deep and shit.”

Peter raised an eyebrow. “Is it deep or are you just dumb?” he asked instead and Sam knew he was hanging out with exactly the right sort of person. 

“I’m just dumb.”

“That’s what I thought too,” Peter said. Then he walked around Sam’s room to his pile of books. “Do you like to read?” he asked. “Because personally I don’t. I mean, why read a book when you can watch the movie? Nothing against novelists but honestly. I just find film to be a much more engaging medium through which to tell a story or communicate a message.”

“And you can’t write a book but you could film a movie?” Sam asked. 

“That too,” Peter agreed, “but you didn’t answer my question.”

“Damn,” said Sam. “I was hoping you’d forgotten.”

“I never forget,” Peter said. “Now, answer dude.”

Sam felt like Peter maybe wanted to say something meaner or funnier but it was a weird place to be at, with new friends. Where you’re kind of testing the boundaries and playing it a little bit safe. 

“Okay, fine,” Sam admitted. “My favorite book is by this guy you definitely haven’t heard of and it doesn’t even matter because let’s never talk about it again. Hey, you know how to juggle?” He picked up an apple that had been by the side of his bed for a least a week and a half now and was definitely little more than brownish mush that would spatter the second he dropped it. 

“Why don’t you want to talk about it?” Peter asked, fixing Sam was an intent look. It made Sam uncomfortable, almost. Scared. 

“It doesn’t matter,” Sam said again, but this time Peter just shot him a quizzical glare before moving on. 

“My favorite book was the Giving Tree when I was a kid.”

“You fucking liar,” Sam said immediately. “That was the book every parent wants their kid to like but no kid actually liked.”

“I --”

“You fucking liar,” Sam said again. “Maybe you love it now but. Not when you were a kid you didn’t.”

“Okay,” Peter admitted, “you’re right.”

Sam beamed. “I know,” he said. 

“Oh, God,” Peter said. “You’re going to be insufferable about this aren’t you?”

Sam just smiled. 

“I’m better at lots of things,” Peter said. “I -- I can say, like, a bunch of facts. Okay. Did you know, that for example, the United States has some of highest rates of recidivism in the world?”

“Recidivism?” Sam asked. 

“Yeah, repeat criminals,” Peter explained. 

The afternoon passes more or less in the same fashion. It’s two friends getting to know the shape of each other, finding the curves and the bends and flat bits. It’s two strangers talking and changing into something that isn’t quite friends but isn’t quite strangers. 

It gets to be so late that Sam asked Peter if he wanted to stay the night. 

“My mom’s going to be so pleased I have a -- good friend who's a guy,” Sam said. “She’s always teasing me for having a girl for a best friend.”

Peter said he had to call his mom to check first and Sam pointed him to their backyard. It was right off of Sam’s room and Peter hadn’t closed the door all the way, so Sam could kind of see what was happening. 

He told himself that he wasn’t going to spy on Peter from his window but. Sam couldn’t help but watch him from inside his room. He couldn’t hear what they were saying, but they talked for more than twenty minutes and at one point in the middle Peter got up to pace. 

Sam wanted to badly to hear what they were talking about but unfortunately he had Morals and Ethics and Didn’t Use His Power For Petty Human Things Like that. 

Peter came back in and the two had dinner with half of Sam’s family which was still, like, one billion people and a dog so. 

After dinner, after getting ready for bed because ‘Samuel, you know very well that it’s a school night and -- not to mention -- way past your bedtime already --’ they lay there, in the dark. 

“What do you want to do when you graduate?” Peter asked him. 

Somehow, in the dark, it was easier to answer. “I don’t know,” he told him honestly. “I like acting and theater but -- as a career? I don’t know. I’ll probably go into college undecided. What about you?”

“I want to make films,” Peter said. 

“Oh my God,” Sam said. “You should join the Morning Show --”

“No,” Peter said. 

“Why not?” Sam asked, excited. “It would be so perfect for you. I mean, absolutely incredible.”

“No,” Peter repeated. “I can’t. I just -- I can’t. Forget it.”

“You would love it, Peter, you should just --”

“I can’t!” Peter snapped. “Just shut up, because I can’t. I would, if I could. But I can’t.”

“Oh,” Sam said. 

“I didn’t mean to --”

“No, I -- it’s -- I didn’t mean to pressure you.”

“You didn’t,” Peter said shortly. “I just don’t like being reminded of things I can’t do.”

Sam wanted to ask why Peter couldn’t do the Morning Show but he also knew better than to push his luck. “Still. Pete. Er. Peter.”

“Pete’s fine,” Peter said. 

“Okay, good,” Sam said. “Or, not good. Just, you know. Whatever. But not whatever. Neutral. You know.”

Peter giggled a bit, which was kind of Sam’s goal. 

“What do you want to do with film?” Sam asked tentatively, as a kind of olive branch. 

“I don’t know. It's never going to happen anyway. So. I've never really thought about it.” Peter was quite a moment. Sam was lying flat on his back in bed, looking up at the ceiling. He wondered if they would be having this conversation if they could see each other’s faces. He wondered why he wanted to see Peter’s face. And then Peter started to speak and Sam shook his thoughts away like troublesome cobwebs. “Something meaningful. I want to do something that impacts people’s lives. That means something.”

“That’s really cool, Pete,” Sam replied and he meant every word of it. “I wish -- I wish I had half as much focus as you did, dude.”

“It’s not always great,” Peter said. “I just --” he cut himself off. “Sometimes it’s hard. It’s just me and my mom.”

“I couldn’t imagine that. My family’s always been huge. Which kind of means that everyone gets ignored sometimes, but it also means no one is every really ignored. Because there’s always someone around. Usually. I mean I can count on two hands and maybe one foot the amount of times this house has been empty. I don’t know how I’d sleep in a quiet house. Or get any work done.”

“You’d get used to it,” Peter said. “It’s easy to get used to things.”

“Not me,” Sam said. “I like my routine.”

“Everyone does,” Peter replied. “But when it changes, we adjust relatively quickly. It’s actually really interesting. To me.”

“What is?” 

“The way we respond to change. You know, we need it. But no one really likes to change. And the process itself is so hard. And long. I don’t know. Sometimes I see it. Sometimes I’m like, why should we even bother?”

“To change?”

“I guess. Sometimes, I just get so frustrated with the way this world is so -- limited, you know?”

That Sam understood. “Yeah. It’s like I’m trapped in this increasingly smaller box.”

“Yeah,” Peter said, sitting up. He looked at Sam in shock. “It’s exactly like that.”

“It’s the worst, right?” 

“For sure,” Peter said. 

They fall silent. 

“Hey,” Peter started, after five minutes. “Can you tell me your favorite book now?”

Sam smiled. “No?” he said. “That’ll go with me to the grave.”

Peter snorted. “Alright, asshole.”

“Why do you want to know?” Sam asked, laughing a bit also. 

“Really?” Peter asked. “You actually want to know?”

Sam really, desperately wanted to know. “Sure,” he said. “If, you know.”

“I’m just curious,” Peter said. “I -- I like to know how things work. You know, how people work or how things break down and, yeah. It’s like a puzzle or something.”

“That stuff doesn’t really bother me,” Sam admitted. 

“It keeps me up at night,” Peter replied. “I just -- I want to shake people and make them make sense. But I can’t do that.”

“Some things don’t make sense, though,” Sam said. 

“Everything makes sense,” Peter replied. “People aren’t mean just to be mean or crazy just to be crazy or criminals just to be criminals. There’s always a reason. There’s always some sort of logic to it.”

“No,” Sam disagreed. “Some people are just mean for no reason. Some people are just shitty. I don’t think I agree.”

“No,” Peter was saying, “I’m not saying every person is, you know, justified. Or that people aren’t, you know, terrible, or shitty, or whatever. But they all have, like, some reason. Some logical explanation for why they --”

“What about serial killers?”

“What?” Peter asked. 

“My mom works for these behavioral scientists, so she always has to transcribe these interviews they have with serial killers and rapists and stuff. And ask them questions. I don’t know. I feel like there’s no understanding them. They’re just crazy.”

Peter listened thoughtfully while Sam was talking, which Sam hadn’t really expected. He spoke when Sam was done. 

“But isn’t that what the behavioral scientists are doing?” Peter asked. “Trying to find out why they did it?”

“We know why they did it,” Sam said. “They’re crazy and evil.”

“Yeah,” Peter asked, “but why?”

“Does it matter?”

“Maybe then you can stop them,” Peter said, which was a good point. “If they know why. They can, I don’t know, prevent it from happening again.”

“I don’t know,” Sam replied. “I feel like there’s a point where, you know. It’s just not worth it anymore. To try and figure it out. Or to reason with them. Or whatever. It’s just -- there’s no way to predict if someone is going to suck or not. There was this dick -- never mind. That doesn’t matter. Just -- I don’t know. Does knowing why someone does horrible things really -- help?”

“It’s just the way I see it, I guess,” Peter explained. “I just want to know why things or why people are the way they are. It’s almost like I need to. It’s also,” he bit his lip, “there’s not always the right stories being told.”

“What do you mean?” Sam asked. 

“I mean, sometimes the right people aren’t telling the right stories. Like with the whole Dylan thing. Not that I know anything about it, but. It’s a narrative that we all believed because it made sense and because it made us feel comfortable and because we didn’t have to think about it. But it wasn’t true. I don’t know, institutions, especially prisons, do that all the time. Thousands of people are exonerated from prison every year, you know?”

“Yeah,” Sam said. 

“And there’s a lot of, biases, racial and, like, otherwise, and, you know. That stuff. Going into it.”

“That’s true. I see what you mean, about the stories. I hadn’t really thought about it like that.”

“Yeah,” Peter said. He didn’t say anything else after that, and the two of them lapsed into an easy silence. Then Peter, giving Sam half a smile, said, “And that’s the reason I want to know your favorite book.”

Sam flashed him a grin back and thought about it. For some reason, the question felt loaded and uncomfortable. There was an undercurrent, a tension to it. This was something that mattered. So Sam opened his mouth, and made a joke. “My favorite book is called Go the Fuck to Sleep.”

“Asshole,” Peter told him, smile slipping away into something a bit sadder. 

Sam pretended he didn’t notice. “Sorry, dude,” he said, forcing a laugh, chest feeling warm and cold at the same time. “That’s just how it be.”

The two of them stopped talking soon after that and Peter went to bed. Sam stayed up for a while, staring at the ceiling and feeling -- strange. Regretful. But even regret couldn’t keep him up past two in the morning so by 4:00am, both of them were sound asleep. 

So sound asleep that they didn’t hear the branches breaking outside, or see the sharp glint of metal in the window, or smell the fire. At least, until it was too late. 

 

* * *

 

Sam woke up an hour after falling asleep, to a ringing phone. Unfortunately, this wasn’t a new phenomenon. “Gabi?” He asked, into the phone. 

“Fire!” Gabi screamed. “There’s a fire in my house, right now, Sam, help!”

“What?” Sam asked. 

“Sam!” 

Sam shot out of his bed and before he knew it, he was half way down the block at Gabi’s house. They’d grown up basically in the same house, and Sam couldn’t imagine living more than half a block away from Gabi at any point in his life. 

Thankfully, he still had a year and a half before she left for college, leaving him to attend Hanover High alone. 

What would happen to their super-hero-ing when Gabi was in college? 

Sam shook the thoughts from his mind, looking out onto the burning building in front of him. It was Gabi’s house. Weirdly, their fire alarm wasn’t going off. 

“Gabi, are you inside?” 

Gabi coughed. “My room. I don’t know -- Sam, there’s fire everywhere!”

“I’m coming,” Sam said and took a deep breath and sprinted into the house.

As it turned out, fire was hot. He ran up to the second floor landing and into Gabi’s room, grabbing her arm and yanking her all the way behind him until they were outside. Where they got outside the house, Gabi collapsed on the ground, coughing. “Sam,” she said, “my parents.”

“Shit, you’re right,” Sam said and ran back in. He tried going back upstairs, but the stairs started falling down as he was running up them, so he ran back down, searching the bottom floor. Thank God Gabi’s older brother was at college and not home. 

“Gabi,” Sam radioed. “Where are your parents?”

“Upstairs,” she said, throat raw and raspy. 

“I don’t -- the stairs fell.”

Sam could hear something, some sort of strange coughing sound. Then he realized it was Gabi. She was crying. “Gabi, I’m going to get them. Gabi I -- I promise,” Sam said but Gabi didn’t respond. 

Sam had never done it before, but he thought -- he thought maybe he could run fast enough to run up the wall. It was the only way up to the second floor, which looked like it was about to go plummeting down with the stairs any moment now. 

Sam closed his eyes and sprinted, pushing himself harder than he ever had before. He almost made it, hands losing a grip on the wood at the last minute. The wood creaked ominously. 

Sam grunted when he hit the ground, dug his feet in, and then tried again. This time, he grabbed the wood and was pulling himself up when the wood jerked downward and Sam lost his grip, falling to the floor. 

The fire was getting really hot. 

“Gabi, I don’t know -- I don’t know if I can do this.”

“Sam, please,” Gabi said. “I just -- I don’t want to lose you to. You don’t -- Sam.” Between the sobs, Sam could barely make out what she was saying. 

He was going to do it this time. He thought about Gabi and about Gabi’s family, taking him to church with them on Sundays, or letting him spend the night every night, or helping Sam with his homework or his drama auditions or -- 

His hand caught on the wood. He pulled himself up, but as he put the extra weight on the fragile, burnt second story, it tilted forward. Sam flung his body up this time, and in a flash he was in her parents bedroom. 

Both of them were huddled together, whispering reassurances to each other. 

“Sam?” They asked, when they saw him at the door. Shit, Sam realized, he hadn’t had time to get his costume. 

“We have to go,” Sam said. 

“There’s -- how did you --”

“Gabi is safe,” Sam said. 

The relief in the room after that was palpable. 

“We have to get out of here now,” Sam repeated, the floor tilting dangerously. “Here -- I have a sort of idea. It might hurt a lot. Give me your hands.”  
Blindly, both of the Granger’s reach out their hands as the house started to fall around them. Sam grabbed them and _ran_.

 

* * *

 

When Sam slipped back into his house, it was a bright and sunny seven thirty in the morning and he smelled like smoke and burnt houses. He should take a shower. He’d have to be careful not to wake Peter, but maybe he could --

Oh, Sam thought, looking at Peter’s strangely inquisitive glare. Peter was already awake. That -- made sense. They had school in less than an hour. 

“What -- where were you? Not to, you know, pry or anything, but,” he wrinkled his nose, which shouldn’t not have been adorable but there you go. Just more evidence that Sam needed to be locked up for his own good, if he was going around finding Peter’s nose adorable. “And why do you -- smell. Like smoke.”

“Um,” Sam thought quickly, desperately trying to think of a lie. Then, he realized, he didn’t have to. “Gabi’s house caught on fire. She called me at --- um, a hellish hour this morning. I can check my phone --”

“Oh my God,” Peter said. “Is she okay?”

Sam nodded. “Everyone’s alive. I stayed until they she was done giving her statement to the police. She and her parents went to a nearby dinner. I think they just -- I mean, the whole house burnt. It’s -- it’s really gone.”

“That’s --” Peter looked like he didn’t know what to say. Then he did something unexpected and, honestly, a little uncomfortable at first. He tentatively put an arm on Sam, and pulled him into a sort of side hug or embrace. 

Sam stiffened and then slowly relaxed, bringing his arms up around Peter’s waist. Resting his head on Peter’s shoulder. He exhaled. 

 

* * *

 

Sam woke in the now-late afternoon, warm and comfortable and -- wearing his jeans? With -- Peter? Holy shit. Sam scrambled up, and Peter sort of turned his head to look at Sam groggily. “Huh?”

“Um,” Sam said, accidentally catching Peter’s eyes. Uncomfortably, he realized that his arm was under Peter’s body wrapped around his waist. Sam couldn’t move, even if he wanted to. He blinked, heart skipping in his chest. Peter’s chest was warm beneath his hand. 

Sam’s breath was coming out shaky. 

No one said anything, though Peter started -- was Peter blushing? His mouth kept opening and closing, which was probably the most distracting thing that could ever have happened in that moment. 

Sam moved closer, just inches away from Peter’s face. Peter swallowed and didn’t move, eyes drinking Sam in. 

God, this was going to kill him. Sam had to get away. He couldn’t -- he couldn’t deal with this right now, with Peter being all adorable and not wearing a shirt and touching him like that and --

He opened his mouth to speak, but his throat was too dry. He cleared his throat. “I --” but he couldn’t think of anything else to say. He couldn’t think of anything else. He was frozen. 

He had to do something. He should -- he wanted to kiss Peter so badly. Just to lean down. It was only a few inches and Peter -- Peter was still here, still in his bed, still -- still had a hand on top of Sam’s hand, Sam realized with a tinge. Peter hadn’t moved yet. Sam could do this. 

He leaned in and opened his mouth. “Um, my arm,” he said, already hating himself, pointing at the arm currently sandwiched between Peter’s torso and the ground. “It’s -- I can’t feel it.”

“What?” Peter asked, twisting around, skin brushing against Sam’s in a way that made his breath catch. He wasn’t looking at Sam, so Sam wasn’t able to see the look of disappointment that crossed his face. “Oh, sorry, no problem.”

And then Peter was getting up and moving away. 

Sam shivered. 

He lifted his arm up, shaking it and poking it. It felt like someone was stabbing it with a million pine needles and maybe a hedgehog. 

“I should get going,” Peter told the ground. “I hope everything is okay with Gabi’s family.”

Shit. Sam’s eyes widened. “Gabi!” He called. He dashed over to his phone. No missed messages. Still, he opened his phone and started composing his text. He was so focused, he almost missed Peter slipping out of the room. 

“I’ll just get going,” Peter repeated. 

“Yeah, sure,” Sam said, distractedly. 

“Okay.” Peter turned and left. 

“Oh, shit, Pete!” Sam called. “Wait!” He sped to the bottom of the stairs, catching Peter just before he left. He pretended to catch his breath. “Wow,” he lied. “I am just so unbearably out of shape.”

“Really?” Peter said, honestly. “I think you’re really fast on your feet actually. It’s -- um, charming. Kind of. Not in a weird way, though. In a good -- well, in -- “

“It’s charming in the best way,” Sam told him. “Thank you for having sense and recognizing my talents.”

Peter rolled his eyes. “This is why people don’t compliment you,” he said. “It just goes to your head.”

“Let me give you a ride home,” Sam said. 

“I -- okay,” Peter agreed, surprising Sam. 

“Yeah, just, wait here,” Sam said, and went back inside to grab his car keys. “Mom! I’m borrowing the car! I’ll be right back!” he yelled. 

“You be back soon, Sammy!” she responded, which surprised Sam. 

“Mom?” he asked. “You’re home?”

“It’s almost one-thirty, Sam. Church is long over. You missed it. Everyone missed you.”

“Sorry, mom,” Sam said sheepishly. “Gabi --”

“I know, love,” she said. “Just make sure you bring the car back three. Your father has an appointment. 

“Course, mom,” he told her. 

He went back outside to where Peter was waiting for him. Peter was resting against the doorframe on his porch, awkwardly trying to cross his arms and lean casually and generally doing a terrible job of both those things. 

“Dude,” Sam said laughing, “you look so tense. Relax.”

“Just worried about your driving,” Peter said. 

The two of them got into the car, but once they were on the road, things felt more awkward. There was -- something in the air, underlying their conversation. Sam took a breath, trying to focus on the road in front of him. 

He put on the music, which was some top forties station his sister loved that honestly still banged. But even the gentle croon of Cardi B couldn’t drown out the tension. 

“So, um, is your mom -- what’s she like?” Sam asked. 

“Normal. I have a normal mom,” Peter said immediately. 

“Dude, that is like the most suspicious thing you could’ve said,” Sam replied. 

“No, it isn’t,” Peter argued. “I could’ve said that she -- eat didn’t eat butterflies, or that she wasn’t responsible for the mysterious murder of my father last year.”

“Oh my God,” Sam said, “your mom’s a murderer?”

“No,” Peter said. “She’s -- normal, she’s normal. My whole family -- it was a -- you’re a fucking asshole,” he ended. 

Sam laughed again. “Don’t hate the player, hate the game.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Peter told him, just shaking his head. 

They seemed to fall back into an easy pattern of banter for the rest of the twenty minute drive back. When they pulled up, Sam was alarmed by how much he didn’t want Peter to go. 

“Um, bye then,” Peter said, and walked away. 

“See you at school!” Sam called, but Peter either didn’t hear or didn’t turn. 

 

* * *

 

As soon as Sam was back home, he took off to find Gabi. 

“Gabi,” Sam said, skidding to a halt in her grandmother’s living room. He’d run past the devastation of the Granger’s old house on his way and it was -- extensive. “Are you okay?”

Gabi sat up, wrapping her arms around her knees. Immediately, Sam went over to her. “It’s my fucking home, Sam,” Gabi said. “My fucking home.”

“Yeah,” he said, rubbing her back. “I know.”

“They -- they went after my family.”

“I’m so, so, sorry,” Sam said. 

“It’s because I talked to that scientist,” Gabi said. “I know it. Whoever has been stealing all that shit -- they wanted me dead last night.”

Sam didn’t know what to say, so he just wrapped his arms around her and held tight. “Do you want to -- stop?” he asked. “Because we totally can. I mean, this isn’t worth your life, it’s not worth --”

“Stop?” Gabi asked incredulously. “After they’ve threatened my family? After they’ve destroyed my home?” Her eyes flashed fiercely. “I don’t want to stop, I want to see these guys destroyed. I want to see Radiowave destroyed.”

“Wait, what?” 

Gabi turned to him. “Are you fucking kidding me, Sam? My house is gone! Everything I ever knew or grew up with -- gone! Are you --”

“No, no,” Sam reassured her quickly. “I want them destroyed to. You know, legally and without murder but. Destroyed. I just -- why Radiowave?”

“He’s involved with this somehow,” Gabi said. “I know it.”

“How?” Sam asked. 

“Because,” Gabi said, “and I’ve been thinking about it, but Radiowave can be placed at every single lab that was broken into.”

“We would’ve noticed that sooner,” Sam said. 

“No,” Gabi said. “Because he’s been smart about it. He’s gathering other people -- acolytes, other supervillians. He’s making them into some sort of team. He visits the facility, takes notes on the security --”

“But Radiowave stops villains,” Sam argued. “At least as much as he helps them. He’s -- I’ve done a few jobs with him, but he works alone. For himself. I don’t think he’s -- evil.”

“You don’t have to be evil to bad things, Sam,” Gabi told him, tiredly. 

“Right,” Sam said, hesitantly, not wanting to argue. “Whatever you need,” he told her honestly, squeezing her shoulder. 

Gabi didn’t respond, just looked blankly ahead. 

Sam stayed with her all day, offering to spend the night. “We have school tomorrow,” Gabi said. 

“Yeah,” Sam rolled his eyes sarcastically. “Because it’s going to take me so long to go home and grab my things.”

“I -- I don’t want to ask my grandmother,” Gabi admitted. “It would just be one more imposition.”

“Oh,” Sam said, suddenly feeling terrible. “You’re -- I didn’t even think. Dude, I’m sorry.”

“Yeah, no, don’t worry about it,” she told him. 

“Besides,” Sam said. “Peter spent the night last night, so I think I might be due for a night alone --”

“Peter what?” Gabi asked. 

“Peter spent the night,” Sam said. 

“You did not tell me  _ this _ !” Gabi shrieked, delighted. 

Sam explained about the project and about the sleeping and about the fire and then, finally, about falling asleep in Peter’s arms. 

“And when I woke up -- we had -- I don’t know. I feel like it was some sort of moment, but I didn’t know what to do and I think I fucked it all up.”

“What do you mean?” 

“I just -- I didn’t do anything. I made some joke or something.”

“Oh,” Gabi said, then she put her hand on Sam’s. “You have to stop being such a little bitch about your feelings,” she told him. 

“Hey, rude,” Sam said. 

“No, dude,” Gabi said. “Facts. You’re like a walking doormat sometimes because you’re too afraid to just be honest about what you want!”

“Gabi, please,” Sam said. “You tell me this at least once a week.”

“And when it stops being true,” she said. “I’ll stop saying it.”

“I just -- I can’t,” Sam said. “Why can’t he make the first move?”

Gabi looked at him like he was crazy. “Um,” she said. “Because he’s Peter Maldonado? And he’s had a crush on you since like, first semester and hasn’t done anything about it in the last, oh, year and a half. So if you’re waiting on Peter -- you’re probably going to be in college or something, by the time he gets around it.”

“God,” Sam said. “College.”

“Exactly, little bitch.”

Sam sighed. “Can you at least stop calling me a little bitch?” he asked. 

“Like I said before,” Gabi said. “I’ll stop saying it when it stops being true.”

 

* * *

 

Gabi didn’t let up that night. She didn’t let up on the bus ride the next morning. She didn’t let up over text. In fact, on their way to lunch, every two secons Gabi would lean over and whisper, “ask Peter out, you pussy,” into Sam’s ear. 

“I’m not going to do that!” Sam protested. “I don’t -- I don’t even know him, okay, and I definitely don’t like --”

“Hello, Peter,” Gabi interrupted him and Sam spun around in horror. 

“Peter!” He blurted out. “What are you -- Hello!”

Peter looked between the two of them, confused and amused. “What were you talking about?” he asked. 

“Nothing,” Sam said, and then immediately started rambling. “I just -- okay, so you know how when -- there’s --”

Gabi saved him. “We were talking about Radiowave!”

Peter’s face fell. “Who?” he asked. 

“Oh,” Sam jumped in excitedly. “He’s kind of Slipstream’s nemesis and --”

“You don’t like him?” Sam was trying to figure out why Peter sounded actually crestfallen or why he looked sad all of the sudden. 

“No, no. I just -- I just hate Slipstream,” Sam lied, because he was really so far gone at this point and any fucking thing he could do to make Peter even that much closer to a smile was like done yesterday. Then he realized what he said. He hated Slipstream? He was Slipstream. 

“Yeah,” Peter gave Sam a strange, sort of a half smile.”I hear he’s a dick.”

Gabi, on the other hand, gave Sam a snort and then elbowed him in the ribcage. 

“What?” Sam demanded. “Who said that? Why do you think think that? What’s --  Ow,” Sam said, glaring at Gabi. 

“Careful,” she warned. “Your crush is showing.”

Peter blinked at them. Sam groaned by Gabi was only too happy to continue. Sam swore to God, if she made Peter think that he was in love with his own alter ego or something -- “-- on Radiowave,” Gabi finished triumphantly. 

“What?” Sam yelped, for the third time. This conversation was really spiraling away from him. 

Peter, for some reason, turned bright red. Gabi laughed. “So when he shit talks Slipstream,” she explained, “I think it’s just jealousy.”

Sam had to step in and defend himself from this character assassination. “Gabi,” he proclaimed. “Is a liar. I do not -- and never have ever -- had a crush on any super-villains. I just think that he is interesting and maybe not evil.” Gabi had her hand over her mouth and she looked like she was stiffling a smile. Sam shot her an extra long glare, with both his eyes narrowed, so that she would know he was serious. “Slipstream, however, is just, um. A jerk?” 

“He’s kind of alright,” Peter told him, shrugging and looking at the ground. 

“I guess,” Sam conceded, because arguing with your crush about how your alter ego was the absolute worst was just a level of insane Sam wasn’t quite at yet.  

“I don’t know,” Gabi said, no longer even pretended to hold back her grin. “I kind of agree with you Sam. Slipstream is just such an arogant, useless, impotent loser.”

Sam tried to telegraph his desire to murder Gabi across the table, but unfortunately (or fortunately) telepathy was not one of Sam’s skills, super or otherwise. 

“Wow,” Peter said, looking between the two of them with wide eyes. “You two feel really strongly about this stuff.”

“Well,” Gabi said, giving Sam a significant look. “Sam does. You two should talk about it.” she got up. “I’m going to go do upperclassmen things.”

“Gabi!” Sam protested. 

Gabi didn’t even turn around when she said, “face it Sam, you’re just not cool enough for me.”

“Fuck you!” Sam yelled back and Gabi flipped him the bird from behind her back. 

Peter laughed softly, which made Sam fake-frown at him. “You traitor,” he said. 

“No, no,” Peter held up his hands in surrender. “I would never think you weren’t cool enough to hang out with. I mean --” Peter blushed deeply and quickly. 

“I’m flattered dude,” Sam told him. “I, personally, am the coolest person I know so --”

“Then you must be the only person you know,” Peter finished, with a smirk. 

“Hey!” Sam protested. “Your supposed to be on my side!”

Suffice to say, Sam did not end up asking Peter Maldonado out that lunch period, though he did keep track of how many times Peter smiled (seventeen), how many times he laughed (twelve), how many times he looked down (eight), and how many times he shoved his hands into his hoodie after taking them out to gesture wildly for some very important point that Sam was definitely listening to and definitely not zoning out while staring at Peter’s eyelashes (twenty-billion). Okay, he lost count of the last one, he’ll admit it, but in his defense, Peter’s eyelashes were pretty much always beautiful and distracting and Peter was also pretty much always passionately making some sort of important point with his hands so. 

Sam was fine. He was fine. This was going to go so well. 

Especially if he didn’t think about being Slipstream or the fire.

 

* * *

 

After the fire, Gabi was obsessed with the police scanner. She brought it into class with her, and got several fake accounts on several very sketchy internet forums and started sending Sam out off the slightest hints or implications. For God’s sake, one of them involved a  _ cat  _ stuck up in a  _ tree.  _ And  _ Radiowave _ had been there for some reason. 

“Radiowave?” Sam asked. “Dude, what are you doing at this high intensity bust?”’

“Um,” Radiowave said. “Crime?”

Sam laughed. “Do you even count as a criminal? All you do is, like, expose other criminals.”

“No,” said Radiowave, unconvincingly. “I’m a bad, bad boy.”

Sam almost fell down, he was laughing so hard. “That’s the funniest thing I’ve ever heard,” Sam told him when he caught his breath. 

“This is why people think you’re a jerk, Slipstream,” Radiowave replied. 

“What? Who? I’m not -- who -- wait a second,” Sam said, pointing a finger at Radiowave accusingly. “You’re trying to -- you’re the jerk!”

“I told you I was a bad, bad boy,” Radiowave said. 

Sam shook his head, smiling. 

 

* * *

 

Weirdly enough, Radiowave also showed up on his next heist. Radiowave had been showing up on a lot of Sam’s heists recently, which sounded suspicious which Sam desperately hoped wasn’t. He still hadn’t mentioned any of them to Gabi, because -- well, Gabi hated Radiowave. 

She blamed him for the fire that burnt down her house. And Sam -- he didn’t disagree, but it was so much harder than he thought to hate someone who he knew, and who brought him -- 

“Cookies?” he asked. “For me?”

“My, um, nan is over. And she, you know, baked extra? I don’t know, you don’t have to take them or anything, it’s just that, never mind --”

“No,” Sam interrupted. “I’ll take them! I’ll take them! Gimme!” he reached out for the cookies, then stopped himself. “Wait.” he narrowed his eyes. “What are you doing here?  _ Crime?!  _ Are these bribery cookies?” he turned his nose up. “You can’t bribe me, not even with cookies.”

“No, ah,” Radiowave said. “I was -- actually,” he turned his head away. “I was looking for -- patrolling the area. Just, you know, in case.”

Sam raised an eyebrow. “So, there’s no catch to the cookies?”

“I -- no,” Radiowave said. “None.”

“Okay.” Sam shrugged. 

“What?” Radiowaved sputtered, and slapped Sam’s hand away. “That’s it? You’re just going to take my word for it?”

“I mean, why not?”

“Why not?” Radiowave asked, incredulously. “I’m,” he gestured down at himself, “a super-villain.”

“So?” Sam asked. 

“So,” Radiowave said, “you’re a super _ hero. _ Never the twain shall meet?”

“Never the what shall what?” Sam asked. “Is that poetry? Are you trying to convince me not to trust you with your delicious cookies and slash or poetry?”

“No -- I -- it’s --”

“Anyway,” Sam said, using his super speed to grab a cookie. “You can’t stop me.” He took a bite. 

“Hey!” Radiowave objected. “Those are my grandmothers!”

“You offered,” Sam pointed out. 

“Yeah, but, I thought -- obviously, I was testing you because -- well, -- I thought they might be poison.”

“You thought? You didn’t know? Aren’t they your cookies?”

Radiowave took a deep breath. “You’re the worst superhero,” Radiowave told Sam, which honestly Sam took as a compliment. 

“Thank you,” Sam replied. 

“It wasn’t a compliment,” Radiowave said. 

“Sure it wasn’t,” Sam told him in a condescending voice. Radiowave, much like Peter, was so easy to rile up -- and, also like Peter, he was really, really fun to rile up. Oh, Sam thought. 

Oh no. 

This wasn’t good. Was Sam -- did Sam -- oh my God. Sam didn’t even know what Radiowave looked like. Sure, he was funny and charming and kind of a bit of a bad boy and -- oh God. Sam could  _ not  _ go down this route. Gabi would never forgive him. 

Harmless, joking lusting? A small crush from a distance? Fine. 

Imagining Radiowave’s blush when Radiowave brought him his grandmother’s homemade cookies? Not fine, not fine at all. That was actually feelings territory. Sam wasn’t going anywhere near actual feelings territory. 

Feelings territory was a dark and scary place where Sam got to experience rejection and betray Gabi’s trust, both at the same time. A unique experience, yes, but one Sam never wanted to experience. 

They ate the cookies together, in silence, waiting for a bad guy who didn’t show. 

 

* * *

 

The next night, Gabi had sent Sam to guard one of the labs. It was the only one that hadn’t been broken into yet and -- it was his third night there. Nothing had happened and, honestly, Sam was convinced nothing ever would.

He’d only gone because he’d seen Radiowave there the last two times and -- maybe he’d be there again. Sam had privately started thinking of laboratory stakeouts as ‘their spot’ which was a thought he’d never be voicing out loud, thanks. 

This time, however, Radiowave wasn’t anywhere to be found. 

Sam told himself he wasn’t disappointed. Radiowave had his own life. He might even have his own homework assignments or work or -- whatever it was super villains did in their down time. Watched Queer Eye?

Suddenly, Sam saw something bright out of the corner of his eye. He swung around and -- moved just in time to avoid a fireball. 

This must be the evil psycho who destroyed Gabi’s home. Sam didn’t hesitate, sprinting forward and grabbing the firestarter. 

Half way back to the treehouse, though, he had to let her go. Her body got hotter and hotter and -- when Sam pulled away, his hands were burned. Slowly, she started getting off the ground. 

“You’re going to regret that --” she started. 

“You’re going to regret ever burning down my friend’s house,” Sam replied, and shot in close for a punch. She went flying backwards, sending thousands of sparks behind her. 

“No!” Sam cried, and then was off, getting buckets and buckets of water and when he finally stopped, the girl was gone. 

Sam started lapping the blocks until he found her, making her way back to the lab. 

“Why do you want to get in there?” he asked. 

In response, she shot a fireball at him. 

Sam ran in to punch her again, but she made a ring around herself of fire. Sam could get in and out but, he realized, not as easily. And she’d probably be able to do something to him when she touched her fire. 

Then there was a strange clicking noise, and there was a ring of fire around him. Sam tried to move, but running just made the flames grow bigger. 

“Stop,” said the Firestarter. “If you move anymore,” she said, “the flames will escape. I won’t be able to stop them. They will destroy this city.”

Sam looked around, desperately. “Why are you doing this?” he asked. “The city -- they’ve done nothing wrong!”

“I have to,” she said. “I have to. Now, don’t move.”

Sam didn’t, terrified of the flames getting bigger. He heard he walking away, and then, had an idea. She had said that his speed -- meaning his oxygen -- fed the flames. But if he just walked, normally, through the fire, it would stay the same size. 

He looked at the flames. He took a deep breath, and stepped forward. 

It was hot as hell, and Sam closed his eyes, expecting excruciating burns. He forced himself to step slowly, feeling like his skin must be peeling away, like his face was melting into plastic, like his --

And then he was free. He looked down, to see if he needed to pat fire out of his supersuit, or if he needed to stop drop and roll. But his suit wasn’t even singed. In face, his hair was even still perfectly styled and coiffed. 

That was an insane level of control. It was almost like -- Sam put his hand in the fire. He held it there and watched as the fire licked around it, closer and closer, but never touching.  

Weird. 

That’s when he noticed the expanded metal ring on the ground. He kicked it with his foot and then -- there was a clicking noise and the metal ring snapped into a small three ring bracelet, flames completely extinguished. 

“Cool,” he said, and pocketed it. 

Then he took off in the direction of the lab, catching Firestarter just before she arrived. “Hey!” he yelled. “You forgot something.” He pulled it out of his pocket and made to throw it at her. 

“Wait, stop!” she yelled, throwing up her hands. 

The bracelet landed on the ground, and snapped around her. Sam stepped closer. “Let me guess,” he said, “it only closes from the outside.”

In response, she pointed a hand that he just now noticed was covered in metal at him, blasting fire at his face. 

Sam barely got out of the way. “Hey!” he shouted, zipping around her. “You don’t even have real powers, do you?”

“So what?” She yelled back. “I could still best you in a fight.” 

Sam raised an eyebrow. “How?” he asked. “I’ve literally got you surrounded. By your own tech.”

“Exactly,” she smiled back. “By  _ my _ own tech.”

She snapped her fingers and the ring of fire snapped back down a bracelet. The two of them stood, arms raised and pointed towards each other. 

There was a strange buzzing noise and then -- a camera?

“What?” Sam asked, spinning around to come face to face with Radiowave. 

“You.” Radiowave’s face darkened. “I’ve been waiting --” 

Sam saw it in slow motion, Firestarter throwing her bracelets. One went circling around Peter, as a blast of fire shot out from her other hand towards the lab. 

Sam rang over to Radiowave, kicking the metal ring. Nothing happened. 

He looked around. The lab was starting to burn down to the ground. And Firestarter was running away. “Look,” he told Radiowave quickly. 

“Go get her!” Radiowave snapped. 

“The lab!” Sam argued. “There are people in it. And you!”

“I’m not important,” Radiowave argued. 

“Look -- I’ll be back. We’ll argue about that in a minute.” Sam took off into the lab, grabbing every single person, guard or animal he could find or hold. After he did that, it went to get water. It took ten minutes to fully douse the blaze and during that time, the fire had grown tighter and tighter around Radiowave. 

Sam sprinted over. 

“Look,” he said. “It’s designed for me. Not for you.”

“What do you mean?” Radiowave asked. And in spite of his best efforts, the terror was clear in his voice. 

“I mean, I can’t come save you. The flames respond to my speed. They getting bigger the faster I run. You’re -- this is going to suck,” Sam told him, “but you’re going to need to walk through it.”

“It’s -- I -- okay,” Radiowave heaved a sigh. “I trust you. I guess. I mean --” he hunched his shoulders and stepped forward. “Oh, fuck,” he said when he hit the flames. 

“Just keep going,” Sam told him and Radiowave did. 

“Ow, fuck, shit, goddamnit,” and then he was out. 

“Kick it!” Sam cheered. 

“What?” Radiowave asked. He looked around. “Hey --” he began. “Why aren’t I --”

“Kick it,” Sam said, interrupting. “Kick the metal circle with your foot.”

Tentatively, Radiowave moved forward. His foot tapped against the metal and Radiowave jumped about a foot in the air when it snapped shut. 

Sam laughed.

“What is this?” Radiowave asked. 

“I don’t know,” Sam said. “I don’t think she has powers though. It’s why you weren’t on fire -- it’s artificial flames. In the braclets. Her -- gloves? -- have the real thing. She burned down my -- someone’s house.”

“I know,” Radiowave said. “I don’t know why, though.”

“She said she didn’t have a choice,” Sam said, frowning. “I don’t know what she meant though.”

Radiowave sighed, frustrated. 

“I know,” Sam said. “If we could just -- talk to her. But -- that’s not going to happen. She got away.”

“She’ll strike again,” Radiowave said. “We’ll get her next time.”

Sam’s stupid heart skipped a beat. Damn, it was getting a huge work out with Sam crushing on two whole people. 

“We?” he asked. 

“Oh, um, sorry, I was just -- unless you don’t want -- it’s just that, with two of us --”

“No,” Sam reassured him immediately. “I’d be happy to -- it’ll be better just -- “

“I’ll text you,” Radiowave said. 

“Oh,” Sam said. “Um, how?” 

Radiowave smirked. “Magic,” he said and walked off into the night. 

Sam sputtered. What the fuck? Who did that? What kind of dramatic mother fucking asshole just said that and  _ left _ dear God? 

Two seconds later, his phone beeps.  _ I have techno powers, idiot, _ reads the message from a blocked number.  _ And don’t worry, I don’t know your number. I’m just sending it to whatever electronic device is nearest to you. _

Oh, Sam thought. That made sense. He was kind of a dumbass. 

 

* * *

 

After that, Radiowave and Sam started working together much more often which, well. It really wasn’t that much of a change, Sam was alarmed to find out. Apparently he and Radiowave were basically superhero friends, or something. Whatever passed for friendship between allies who were technically on opposite sides. 

The other thing that didn’t really change was that Sam continued keeping it from Gabi, which made his stomach twist u p into all kinds of terrible, terrible knots every time he thought about it. 

Sam hated lying to Gabi. He hated lying to anyway, but he hated lying to Gabi more. The only other time he’d ever done anything remotely close was when he was -- hiding his sexuality. And he hated it so much, he’d just started wholesale avoiding Gabi until she cornered him in the bathroom and demanded to know what the hell had gotten into his dumbass bonehead skull this time and she swore to God if he told her he was in love with her should would --

Then Sam had said he was gay, in a kind of small and quiet voice that he wished weren’t so small and quiet and Gabi had hugged him and Sam had pretended like he didn’t care and he’d never been avoiding Gabi at all because if there was one thing he hated more than lying, it was confrontation. 

So Sam pushed all his guilt deep, deep down and pretends like he isn’t lying to Gabi and like this isn’t a big deal. It probably isn’t, but everytime he thinks about telling Gabi he’s been working with Radiowave, he started thinking about how angry she would be and his entire mind just shys away from even thinking about the possibility of bringing it up with her. 

Instead, Sam worked with Radiowave at night and made goo goo eyes (Gabi’s words) at Peter during the day and it’s -- it’s going. He was starting to think that maybe -- maybe Peter liked him back, or something, but. Then he’d think of Radiowave and -- it just felt wrong, for some reason. 

It was like he was cheating on Radiowave, whenever he thought about Peter. And Radiowave didn’t deserve that. 

He was a super-villain, yes. But that was only because he had such strong convictions. He -- he was actually a lot like Peter in that sense, if Sam was honest with himself, which. Well. Apparently Sam had a type. 

And apparently that type was uptight, overly serious, driven, social awkward geniuses. 

So Sam continued spending his school days not looking and Peter and definitely not doodling little hearts around his name in his notebooks in the back of class or making playlists that reminded him of Peter, or anything like that. 

“Hey Sam!” Peter called. 

Sam dropped all his books and accidentally upended his pencil case. “Peter!” his voice was way higher than he wanted it to ever sound. He coughed. “Hey, Peter,” he said in a much lower voice. 

“You need help?” Peter offered. 

“Oh, no,” Sam said, immediately, reassuring him, but Peter was already bending down -- oh God -- and grabbing Sam’s things. 

And then! And then he was  _ handing them to Sam,  _ which meant that his  _ hand  _ was touching Sam’s  _ hand  _ and -- this should literally be illegal. 

Sam swallowed. “Thanks, dude.”

Peter smiled back. “No problem.” God, his smile was beautiful. Peter looked down, then back up again. “Hey,” he said. “Do you think you might -- um, never mind.”

“No,” Sam insisted. “What?”

“No, no. Don’t worry about it,” Peter said. “I was going to say something, but -- never mind. No.”

“Tell me,” Sam said. 

“It was dumb,” Peter replied, eyes starting to flash anxiously. “I --” he looked up and then the bell rang. 

“That’s -- early,” Sam said, checking his watch and frowning. “We should still have at least seven more minutes of lunch.”

Peter shrugged, looking guilty. “What can you do,” he replied. “We’re all, you know, slaves to the man or whatever.”

Sam laughed, and watched Peter head off to class. 

Peter had actually been acting weird all week. He kept zoning out when Sam was talking to him, and last Monday he had caught Peter giving himself a pep talk in the bathroom. 

It was -- strange. 

Peter had also been hanging out a lot more with the Wayback Boys. Not that Sam cared, or that Sam noticed or was stalking him or anything, but Peter was appearing in the Wayback Boys videos at three times his regular rate, which was something Sam had actually calculated because somehow putting things to math made the fluttering beneath his skin die just a little bit. 

But Sam didn’t really pay that much attention. He went out at night, flirted with a strange leather clad person who went by the name Radiowave, saved a few hundred thousand dollars and one very grateful man, and that was just Tuesday 

He had a sleepover with Gabi on Wednesday. 

It was a normal week. 

Until, on Thursday, two things happened in rapid succession. The second thing was that Radiowave texted him. The first was. Well. 

On Thursday morning, Sam walked into school. He was about two minutes early, which was honestly -- incredibly rare for him. The second he stepped on campus, Peter, who had been slouching and chatting aggressively with a girl Sam thought he remember as Ganji or something, caught his eye. 

Then the girl punched Peter, and Peter rolled his eyes and -- 

So sue him, Sam was curious. He decided to -- cheat a little -- and do a little run by. 

And then he caught his name and ‘ask out’ and skidded to a halt and -- 

“Do what now?” he asked. 

Peter’s eyes narrowed at the girl, and then he spun to face Sam. Sam was surprised to see his cheeks were red. “What are you doing this weekend?” Peter asked, in a very angry and determined voice. 

“Um,” Sam said. “Stuff.”

“Wow,” Peter replied on autopilot, “and here I was, worried about my position as number one in Mr Fong’s english class.”

“Fuck you,” Sam told him. “What are you doing this weekend?”

Peter smirked. “Stuff.”

“You know --”

The girl interrupted them. “Stop being a little bitch, Peter.”

Peter whipped around furiously to face her. “Would you -- would you just -- go?” he finally was able to spit out. Entirely unbothered, Ganji or whoever got up and slowly walked away, muttering the words “little bitch” under her breath. 

That taken care of, Peter turned his laser focus onto Sam who found, quite literally, that he was unable to breath. “What are you doing Saturday night?” Peter asked. “And would you like, I mean, want, I mean, if, I mean. Dinner.”

Sam just stared at him. 

Peter sighed. “Dinner. Saturday. Me, and. Um. You. If you --”

“Like a date?” Sam asked. “Like, for real, you and me, on a --”

But Peter was already turning away, and saying things like, “it’s okay if you don’t want to” and “it’s just that our friendship is so important to me” that Sam had to interrupt him. 

He grabbed Peter’s hand without thinking about it, just to stop him from leaving. They made eye contact. Sam dropped his hand like he had been burned. 

Then, tentatively, he grabbed it again. “Um,” he said. 

Peter gave Sam time to find his words. The problem was, Sam didn’t find his words. He just held Peter’s hand and stared at him. 

“Um,” he said again. 

“Is this, um, a yes?” Peter asked and Sam nodded and Peter’s entire body just sags with -- with relief, Sam realized. Peter had been nervous. Oh, God, that was adorable. 

There was an announcement over the loudspeaker a second later. “Attention! Students! It appears the bell has not gone off at it’s usual time, but class has started three minutes ago.” The loudspeaker crackled and then turned off. 

Peter had a strange smirk on his face. Neither of them moved. 

“I’m looking forward to tomorrow night,” Sam said. 

“Saturday,” Peter corrected. 

“Whatever,” Sam teased. “I’m going to be late anyway.”

Peter snorted. “I’ve never met anyone with as much of a problem keeping track of time than you. Oh,” he said. “And I should -- I should let some, some person -- people -- know I’m going to be busy, if you wouldn’t --”

Sam’s phone went off just then. He ignored it. It was probably Gabi. 

Peter, however, was staring at him, with his eyes wide. “Who was that?” Peter asked. 

Sam shrugged. “Just Gabi?” His phone went off again. This time, Peter jumped. His phone went off again. 

Sam opened it up, getting ready to tell Gabi to chill when -- 

It was Radiowave. 

“Who is it?” Peter asked quietly. 

It felt like someone had taken the floor out from Sam and replaced the background noise of his highschool with a high pitched beeping. “Gabi,” he lied, unable to look Peter in the eye. 

“I’ve got to go to class,” Peter said. 

“Yeah,” Sam said. “See you -- Fri -- Saturday.”

Peter didn’t respond, just ran off to class. 

Sam stared at the text messages. 

Radiowave had a clue, the first one said. 

Radiowave couldn’t investigate Saturday, but he was free Friday or Sunday, the second one said. 

The third one just said,  _ thanks.  _

Sam went to class. 

 

* * *

 

He and Radiowave made plans to investigate a lead of Firestarter’s identity that Radiowave had found on a social media feed on Sunday. Sam had patrols on Friday. It’s when most of the robberies happened, so it wouldn’t be good to out of touch for a whole night. 

Radiowave actually texted him three more times on Friday. All three times were when Sam was with Peter, which made Sam feel like there really was a God up there and that He was punishing Sam specifically for liking two different men. 

Peter still seemed weird -- more quiet than usual, which was saying a lot. 

But Sam put that down to nerves, especially because Peter had shaken the mood off completely by the end of the day Friday and even let Sam walk him to the bus. 

“I’ve been meaning to catch the DVD version, but, of course, that isn’t easy, when --”

“Netflix exists?”

“I mean,” Peter said. “Yeah. They suck.”

“They’re literal evil. Basically just another super-villain.”

That got a laugh out of Peter. “Yeah.”

The two of them fell into an easy silence, walking the last block and a half to the bus stop. Just before they got there, however, Peter, hesitating slightly, pulled him aside. “Wait,” Peter said. “I want to show you something.”

“Okay,” Sam agreed because honestly. What was he going to do, say no?

Peter grabbed his hand and pulled Sam through the gab between a chain link fence blocking off the tennis courts. He kept hold of Sam’s hand as he brought him across the court and into a small, densely wooded clearing. 

It was -- beautiful. Peter still didn’t let go of Sam’s hand. 

“What is this?” he asked. 

“I liked to explore, when I was a kid. I just -- thought. It’s nice. And -- I wanted to. Well. Thank you for walking me to the bus stop.”

Sam meant to reply. He opened his mouth and he fully intended for words to come out. But when he looked at Peter, he couldn’t. Everything else seemed to slip away and then he was leaning forward, and Peter was leaning in and -- 

It really was kind of like fireworks, but it was also kind of the most awkward thing he had ever done in his life. Where did he put his tongue? His hands? What did he do with -- did he open his eyes? He peaked. 

Peter’s eyes were closed. Sam closed his eyes too. 

Then Peter’s hand came up and grabbed the side of his face and -- Sam could do this. 

When they finally broke apart, four or five minutes later, Sam’s lips were still buzzing. He kept wanting to run a hand over them to pinch himself or --

“I just wanted to -- before I -- goodbye,” Peter told him. 

“Babe,” Sam said, trying it out. “Now I’m really looking forward to Saturday.”

“Yeah,” Peter said, not quite meeting Sam’s eyes. “Me too.”

 

* * *

 

The ironic thing was, Sam was ten minutes early to the date. He knew how Peter liked punctuality. Sam was never early, but. He was excited and terrified and he’d never been on a date before and he just -- it was Peter. So Sam was on early. 

He waited outside the restaurant at first, but quickly started feeling awkward. People kept walking by and Sam didn’t know if they were giving him Looks or if he was imagining it, but still. 

At 7:15 exactly, he entered the restaurant. He waited a few more minutes, wondering where the hell Peter could possibly be and reassuring himself that some people had to deal with pedestrian issues like traffic and couldn’t just sprint to restaurants with superspeed. 

Peter would be here. Sam would just have to wait. 

 

* * *

 

Forty-five minutes later, with no sign of Peter, and Sam was starting to consider, maybe, giving up. 

An hour later and Sam knew. It was possible --  _ certain,  _ Sam told himself -- that Peter wasn’t really coming. Sam had just thought -- he’d thought that Peter liked him, for some reason. Stupid, really. 

Sam didn’t know what was worse: the idea that Peter had just completely forgotten about him, or that he was victim to another one of Peter and the Wayback Boys pranks. 

He swirled his glass of water. God, this was embarrassing. He just -- oh God. He’d been here, without ordering, for forty five goddamn minutes. He had to -- he just had to leave. He started gathering his things and then, before leaving, against his will, he checked his phone. 

No message from Peter. He wasn’t coming. Probably. Sam hoped -- but. 

It was fine. 

Sam didn’t care. It was a long shot anyway. It wasn’t, like, a date. It was just -- it was hanging out with some guy who actually listened when he spoke and who cared about stupid, heavy things like integrity and making a difference and -- it was nothing. It didn’t matter. Sam turned off his phone and put it in his pocket. 

Two seconds later, it rang and Sam practically fell over himself trying to put it out. 

“Hello! Sam! Speaking!”

“Sam, thank God!”

“Oh, shit, it’s just you,” Sam said. 

“Fuck you too,” Gabi replied. “Anyway, I’m sorry to interrupt your big date but --”

“No,” Sam said miserably, not even able to banter back. “It’s -- it’s not a big date.”

“What?”

“He -- it doesn’t matter,” Sam told her. “He changed his mind. He, um. He’s not here. So, I’m just going to -- go.” Gabi let him hang up, and then Sam put his phone on silent. 

After an hour and thirty minutes, Sam got up and, wincing as he caught the look of pity in the waiter’s eyes, left the restaurant. It was over. 

**Author's Note:**

> let me know what you think!! i'm avpetermaldonado on tumblr if u wanna say hi or discuss these two assholes ever 
> 
> i just -- ugh im not 100% happy with this but -- i just wanted to get it out there already haha


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